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Richard West
Richard West (1716 - 1 June 1742) was an English poet. Life West was the only son of lawyer and playwright Richard West (died 1726), Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and Elizabeth (Burnet), 2nd daughter of Bishop Burnet.William Prideauz Courtney, Richard West (d.1726), Dictionary of National Biography 60, London: Smith, Elder, 1899, 339. Wikisource, Web, Jan. 7, 2017. He was educated at Eton with Thomas Ashton, Thomas Gray, and Horace Walpole, forming a "quadruple alliance" of friendship, and was known among them as "Favonius." In youth he was "tall and slim, of a pale and meagre look and complexion," and he was then reckoned a more brilliant genius than Gray. West had "a fine sensibility to literary influences and a genius for friendship" (Prof. Dowden, in Academy, 11 Oct. 1890, p. 309). His character was "extremely winning" (Gosse, "Gray," in Men of Letters, pp. 5–54). The rest of the friends went to Cambridge, but West matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, on 22 May 1735 at the age of 19.Courtney, 339. West was from his youth marked out for the profession of the bar, through the influential positions of his father and his uncle, Sir Thomas Burnet. On 21 Feb. 1737-8 he was at Dartmouth Street, Westminster; by the following April he had left Oxford, and was studying at the Inner Temple, where he had been admitted on 17 July 1733. Gray came to London in September 1738 to join him at the bar, but was drawn off into travelling with Walpole. West sent Latin elegies to Gray when on his travels, and addressed to him the "Ode to May' beginning with : Dear Gray, that always in my heart : Possessest still the better part. West then thought of the army as a profession, but his strength was failing, and in September 1741 Gray found his friend ill and weary in London. In March 1742 West was at Pope's (or Popes), 2 miles to the west of Hatfield in Hertfordshire, the seat of David Mitchell. A few days later he was racked by a "most violent cough," and he died at Pope's on 1 June 1742. He was buried in the chancel of Hatfield church, immediately before the altar-rails. The Countess of Huntingdon deplored his loss, in a letter to John Wesley (Life and Times of Countess of Huntingdon, i. 39, 40).Courtney, 340. Writing Samuel Rogers said, "If West had lived he would have been no mean poet" (Table Talk, pp. 40). Both Gray and Mitford designed to collect West's remains, but died before their work was done. A selection from his poems appeared in Park's British Poets, vol. iv. of Supplement, pp. 67–74; Bell's Poets, vol. c.; and Anderson's Collection, vol. x.; all his known pieces are contained in Tovey's Gray and his Friends. At Walpole's request his "Monody on Queen Caroline" was inserted in Dodsley's Collection, ii. 274, and it was reprinted in Bell's Fugitive Poetry, xv. 119–24; certain lines in it may be regarded as the germs of part of Gray's "Elegy." A poem signed ‘Richard West’ is in Alexander Dalrymple's English Songs (1796), pp. 142–3. Some "very indecent poems by him" are said by Samuel Rogers to be among the papers at Pembroke College. Tovey speaks of a lost tragedy by him entitled Pausanias. Among Mitford's manuscripts at the British Museum (Addit. MSS. 32561–2) are copies of letters to and from West. Many of these were published for the first time in the Rev. D.C. Tovey's Gray and his Friends (pp. 65–172). Walpole's letters to him, 20 in all, were printed in 1798 in the set of Walpole's Works which was edited by Miss Berry and her father, and are included, with the answers, in Cunningham's edition of Walpole's Correspondence. His correspondence with Gray has been printed by Mason and Mitford in their editions of that poet. Recognition A gravestone to his memory was placed in the floor of Hatfield church. Gray embalmed his friend's memory in a very tender sonnet in English ("On the Death of Richard West"), and also addressed to him as "Favonius" the Latin poem "De Principiis Cogitandi." Publications *''Poetical Works'' (edited by John Bell). Edinburgh: Apollo Press, by the Martins, 1782. *''English Poems and Translations'' (edited by Rintarō Fukuhara). Tokyo: Kyoritsu Joshi Daigaku, 1959. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtessy WorldCat.Search results = au:Richard West 1742, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Jan. 7, 2016. See also *List of British poets References * . Wikisource, Web, Jan. 7, 2016. Notes External links ;Poems *"Ode" *"A Monody on the Death of Queen Caroline" ;About *"On the Death of Richard West" by Thomas Gray *Richard West (1716-1742) at English Poetry, 1579-1830 * West, Richard (1716-1742) Category:1716 births Category:1742 deaths Category:18th-century poets Category:English-language poets Category:English poets Category:Old Etonians Category:People educated at Eton College Category:Poets Category:Poets who died before 30